Science | Thomas Connolley

Thomas Connolley
JEEP: Joint Enginnering, Environmental and Processing

Thomas Connelly Thomas Connolley is Beamline Scientist for I12, the Joint Engineering, Environmental & Processing (JEEP) beamline. He trained as a metallurgist and is experienced in mechanical property testing, microstructural characterisation and failure investigation. He has worked in the aerospace industry, materials consultancy and biomedical engineering research.

Email: Thomas Connolley
Tel: +44 (0) 1235 778485
Beamline I12: Joint Engineering, Environment and Processing (JEEP)

Key Research Areas

Energy-dispersive X-ray diffraction. X-ray imaging and tomography. In-situ processing. Mechanical properties of materials. Microstructural characterisation.

Current Research Interests

I spent most of the period 2006-2010 helping design, install and commission the I12 beamline. Now the beamline is operational, I’m starting to build up my research activity again. I’d welcome enquiries from users interested in using energy-dispersive diffraction for in-situ experiments.

Currently I’m collaborating with a group at Imperial College, London, who built a special rig to perform imaging, tomography or diffraction on materials under mechanical loads at different temperatures. The rig can be used with a furnace or a freezing unit, which gives a lot of possibilities for different experiments. For example, using the furnace, tomography experiments have been performed on solidification in aluminium-iron alloys, with the aim of improving the quality of alloys made from re-cycled material. With the freezing unit, studies are planned to simulate how the permafrost in arctic regions might behave if it starts to melt due to climate change.

Selected Publications

  1. “Region-of-interest tomography using filtered back projection: assessing the practical limits” Kyrieleis, A; Titarenko, V; Connolley, T; Ibison, MG; Withers P; Journal of Microscopy. Published online 21/06/2010 DOI : 10.1111/j.1365-2818.2010.03408.x (2010)
  2. “Polycrystal deformation analysis by high energy synchrotron X-ray diffraction on the 112 JEEP beamline at Diamond Light Source” Korsunsky, AM; Song, X; Hofmann, F; Abbey, B; Xie, MY; Connolley, T; Reinhard, C; Atwood, RC; Connor, L; Drakopoulos, M; Materials Letters 64, 1724-1727 (2010)
  3. “Bonding of single crystal silicon to Cu and AlN: trial results” Connolley, T; Hanks, S; Drakopoulos, M; Hill, T; Science And Technology of Welding And Joining 14, 1-3 (2009)
  4. “Obtaining local reciprocal lattice vectors from finite-element analysis” Sutter, JP; Connolley, T; Hill, TP; Huang, HC; Sharp, DW; Drakopoulos, M; Journal of Synchrotron Radiation 15 584-592 (2008)
  5. “Ray traces of an arbitrarily deformed double-crystal Laue X-ray monochromator - art. no. 70771N” Sutter, JP; Connolley, T; Drakopoulos, M; Hill, TP; Sharp, DW; SPIE Advances in X-Ray/Euv Optics and Components III 7077, N771-N771 (2008)
  6. “Finite element comparison of performance related characteristics of balloon expandable stents” Donnelly, EW; Bruzzi, MS; Connolley, T; McHugh, PE; Computer Methods in Biomechanics and Biomedical Engineering 10, 103-110 (2007)
  7. “X-ray micro-tomography of a coronary stent deployed in a model artery” Connolley, T; Nash, D; Buffiere, JY; Sharif, F; McHugh, PE; Medical Engineering and Physics 29, 1132-1141 (2007)
  8. “The influence of grain size on the ductility of micro-scale stainless steel stent struts” Murphy, BP; Cuddy, H; Harewood, FJ; Connolley, T; McHugh, PE; Journal Of Materials Science-Materials In Medicine 17, 1-6 (2006)
  9. “A combined experimental and computational study of deformation in grains of biomedical grade 316LVM stainless steel” You, X; Connolley, T; McHugh, PE; Cuddy, H; Motz, C; Acta Materialia 54, 4825-4840 (2006) 
  10. “A review of deformation and fatigue of metals at small size scales” Connolley, T; McHugh, PE; Bruzzi, M; Fatigue and Fracture of Engineering Materials and Structures 28, 1119-1152 (2005)